Editor's Note: Today we feature Margaret O'Hanlon's introductory post to her Classic series on effective implementation.
Each year we step back to adjust to an updated business strategy that addresses new challenges. We plan alignment of objectives, behaviors and performance with that strategy. And then we try for effective implementation of the strategy so we can achieve the planned-for results . . . results that fund financial success and compensation.
This is the virtuous cycle in which you invest your hard work and the company's money.
As we all know, HR plays a critical role as facilitator of alignment and educator of effective implementation. Many of you are in the midst of the objective setting process right now, where you are responsible for training and facilitating the cascade of objectives within your organization.
Objectives that employees should be developing to link with corporate performance. Otherwise, their work will have only a glancingly positive impact on financial and operational results -- or could misguidedly create obstacles that have negative impact on those results.
There is no doubt that your employees' ability to adapt to each new strategy impacts the success of your company. Look at this result from the World's Most Admired Company research conducted by the Hay Group in partnership with Fortune Magazine. It makes it clear that "Most Admired Companies" do a far better job of implementing their strategies (and achieve significantly higher Total Shareholder Returns).
And their HR organizations do a better job of implementation, too. Implementation of new programs and existing programs like compensation that can truly play a role in the business strategy when employees see strong linkages and understand how they can impact success.
Over my next few blog postings, I'm going to cover what effective implementation means, how it can help you and what you can think about doing differently. I thought it would be a great time of year for this discussion since you'll be turning new ideas into plans over the next few months.
Turning great intentions into business results is really where the rubber meets the road. Great ideas become actual business opportunities only when people understand clearly and then are willing and able to do the tough work of changing to a new focus and new practices.
I'll be talking about communications and I'll be talking about change management, too. After all, compensation is a form of change management. Every paycheck sends the message that we expect employees to assess a changing environment and profit from changing opportunities.
Margaret O'Hanlon, CCP brings deep expertise to discussions on employee pay, performance management, career development and communications at the Café. Her firm, re:Think Consulting, provides market pay information and designs base salary structures, incentive plans, career paths and their implementation plans. Earlier, she was a Principal at Willis Towers Watson. A former Board member for the Bay Area Compensation Association (BACA), Margaret coauthored the popular eBook, Everything You Do (in Compensation) Is Communications, a toolkit that all practitioners can find at https://gumroad.com/l/everythingiscommunication.
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